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trial balance

American  

noun

Bookkeeping.
  • trial balances
    plural
  1. a statement of all the open debit and credit items, made preliminary to balancing a double-entry ledger.


trial balance British  

noun

  1. accounting a statement of all the debit and credit balances in the ledger of a double-entry system, drawn up to test their equality

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

Etymology

Origin of trial balance

First recorded in 1830–40

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

See Examples For:

I made out a trial balance for the business of the last six months.

From Desk and Debit or, The Catastrophes of a Clerk by Oliver Optic

"You have been faithful, and you have kept your books remarkably well; but taking a trial balance isn't your forte yet."

From Desk and Debit or, The Catastrophes of a Clerk by Oliver Optic

"You told me to look into the system of keeping the books, and I thought I could not do it any better than by getting out a trial balance for the last six months."

From Desk and Debit or, The Catastrophes of a Clerk by Oliver Optic

As he said, he wanted to settle his accounts and take his trial balance, and the presence of another person might be disturbing to that process.

From Atlantis by Adele Szold Seltzer

The Batavian Republic now could make up a little trial balance.

From The Rise of the Dutch Kingdom 1795-1813 by Hendrik Willem Van Loon

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